Talking Identity and Heritage - AAPI Month
Rea as a baby, her mother, and her brother all pose for a photo.
For AAPI month, we sat down and spoke to two of our staff members about what AAPI Heritage Month means to them. First, we hear from Rea, from our Community Development team, about the struggle of connecting with your identity and heritage. Then, we hear from Eric, from our Welcome Center, about assimilating to American culture.
What do you identify as ethnically?
Rea: My parents are both from New Delhi, India so I identify as a first generation, South Asian woman.
Tell us about holding these identities in mainstream American Culture.
Rea: A lot of people don’t really believe me when I say I’m Asian American, but I have to remind people that India is a part of Asia! It’s easier for me to identify as South Asian or Desi than as an Asian American, but that shouldn’t be the case. Even with all the push for diversity and stopping AAPI hate, the people being uplifted are primarily East Asian. There’s so much rich culture in Asia and the Pacific Islands that doesn’t get the recognition they deserve. When I was younger, I often struggled with my identity and called myself a “coconut”, brown on the outside and white on the inside. I remember making jokes about my own culture so I could try to distance myself from my identity. However, as I grew older, I found myself connecting more with my family and my heritage.
How do you balance your identities?
Rea: For me, my identities are intrinsically linked to each other. Being a South Asian, gay, disabled, woman, none of my identities can exist without the other. Being able to find other queer women of color has been helpful in finding balance among my identities, as well as having people to relate to. Depending on which community I’m around, I have to figure out which identities I’m going to be holding first. However, when I’m around the queer women of color community, all of me can exist at once, proudly.
How do you connect to your heritage and identities?
Rea: Since I spent so much time trying to fight my identity when I was younger, I feel like I didn’t get to start connecting with my heritage and culture til recently. What helped me most was joining a program of South Asian writers and filmmakers and being able to hear their stories. I got to meet South Asian creatives from all over the world who were passionate about creating stories for people like us. It was a special experience where I got to see myself represented and supported in a way I never have before.
As a queer woman of color who has had to fight to get into traditional film spaces, it was amazing to be welcomed by my community. There are so many stories to be told from and about the South Asian community and we’re working hard behind the scenes to bring that into the mainstream.
Thank you for sharing with us!
Hi Eric. Tell us a little about your AAPI identity and journey.
Eric: As the first generation of immigrants of our family, the journey hasn’t been really easy for us. We moved from Taiwan to the US in the mid 90s, and we’ve been living here in the Bay Area for almost 30 years. I have to say, the language barrier is still my #1 problem when I try to survive in this society so far. Sometimes it’s not because I can’t express myself to other people. It’s the accents that I have with me that can cause people to categorize me into “lower” groups of society. Strangely, that happens between both American born Chinese people and Chinese immigrants. More than 60% percent of my family from both my parents sides have moved to the USA and our family was the last family to do so. Some of my cousins are second or third generation. It’s interesting to see some of my cousins only befriend or date people from certain races. I can always tell some of them have totally abandoned their origins from the conversations I have with them. They don’t like the labels, “Asian” or “Chinese”. I don’t quite understand why they act like that.
Was it worth it for you and your family to immigrate to the US?
Eric: There was a period of time that I started questioning whether this decision was the right thing to do. Would my life be better or different if I stayed in my country, Taiwan? If people ask me that question now, I can tell them with confidence, Different?? Yes, for sure. Better? Not necessarily!!
Even though the whole journey hasn’t been quite easy for me and my family, I’ve seen and learned a lot from people that I’ve met and it has made the whole experience very unique and interesting. Now when I look at things, I know how to do that from different perspectives. Because of cultural differences, people do or look at things differently. Now I cherish my friendships with people from different races even more. They extend my horizon when I look at this world. And I certainly hope I would be the same to them, just like they are to me.
So what does AAPI heritage month mean to you?
Eric: What does AAPI heritage month mean to me? And am I proud of who I am and where I come from? It really means a lot to me. Moving to the US and trying to survive in this society has been a bittersweet journey. And I cherish every moment of it. One thing for sure, this journey has only made me who I am and proud of where I come from. And I love to talk about everything in Taiwan to my friends and I always love to listen to their stories about their cultures. So I am just grateful that I am where I am now!!